A recent study has revealed how citizens’ attitudes towards cloud
computing and their governments’ ability to regulate the cloud vary
globally. Titled ‘Personal data in the cloud’, the study found that
citizens in China are 25 per cent more likely to trust their government
than the global average.

According to the study by Fujitsu, the Chinese are also 20 per cent
more likely to believe that the government should play a role in
facilitating data sharing. Citizens in the United States on the other
hand are 20 per cent less likely to trust their government with
their data.

Among the Asia Pacific countries surveyed, Australia and Japan have
the most receptive attitudes to cloud computing and data sharing; 23 per
cent and 21 per cent of their respective citizens were labelled as
“advocates”, or supporters, of the technology.

Singapore, China and India take the fourth, second and first
positions, respectively, of countries with the smaller proportion of
advocates (nine per cent; five per cent; and four per cent).

When asked to evaluate the role of government in making citizen data secure, different countries picked different solutions.

Chinese citizens expect active intervention from the government,
wanting the authorities to play a key role in facilitating data sharing.
In Japan, citizens prefer their government to play a positive yet
passive role — keeping data secure and providing advice.

The study identifies trust as the main cause of objection to the uptake of cloud technology. Only 20 per cent trust governments to look after their data.

However, there are certain scenarios in which the benefits of cloud
computing were deemed to outweigh its detriments. In Japan, Singapore
and Australia, a centralised medical data bank (35 per cent, 46 per
cent, and 48 per cent, respectively) and a platform for monitoring the
well being of the elderly (38 per cent, 53 per cent, and 63 per cent,
respectively) were identified as potential plus points.

Across the 12 countries surveyed, the top solutions picked for government’s role in data sharing were:

A recent study has revealed how citizens’ attitudes towards cloud computing and their governments’ ability to regulate the cloud vary globally Titled ‘Personal data in the cloud’ the study found that citizens in China are 25 per cent more likely to trust their government than the global average